i'm wolf blitzer in the situation room. we're following breaking news. we're also standing by for a briefing over at the white house. you're looking at live pictures from the white house rose garden. the coronavirus task force is scheduled to begin fairly soon. we'll have coverage of that coming up. also today, it's been the deadliest day of the outbreak so far here in the united states. get this, at least 486 new deaths pushing the total to nearly 3,000 dead here in the united states. and the total number of cases to more than 158,000. the rising numbers and dire warnings from public health officials prompted president trump to extend social distancing guidelines until at least, at least april 30th, and back away from his earlier call to reopen the nation by easter sunday, april 12th, which he now says those goals were, in his word, aspirational. in new york city, that's the epicenter of the crisis in the

u.s., the "usns comfort" arrived in port today where officials hope the floating hospital will relieve the burden on the city's health care system. let's go to cnn's nick watt, joining us with more on today's coronavirus developments. there have been some very dramatic developments, nick. give us the latest. >> reporter: well, wolf, here in california we've seen the number of hospitalizations double in just the past four days. pretty much any expert you talk to will say this is still going to get worse before it gets better. an ominous sign, virginia today implemented a stay-at-home order. and that is going to be in place, unless something changes, until june 10th. that is more than ten weeks away. a life lost in brooklyn. one of thousands now across this country. >> i would like to avoid it. i wouldn't be surprised if we saw 100,000 deaths. >> reporter: today a navy hospital ship docked in new york

city. the last time this great hospital ship was in new york was in the wake of 9/11. a field hospital now in central park and fines for those who refuse to social distance. >> the fines are in the range of 250 to $500. that is a violation of a summons that would be provided. i don't want to see that happen. >> what you see us going through here, you will see happening all across this country. there is no american who is immune to this virus. >> reporter: the federal social distancing guidelines the president had hoped to ease, just extended another month. >> we argued strongly with the president that he not withdraw those guidelines after 15 days, but that he extend them. and he did listen. >> reporter: state to state travel restrictions also spreading. rhode island now ordering all

vifr jurisdictions to self-quarantine. from noon today, anyone traveling to texas from these states and cities must self-quarantine 14 days. hotspots in all those places. and now it's time, we're told, for more rural areas to brace themselves. >> if the metros and rural areas don't take care now, by the time you see it, it will have penetrated your community significantly. >> reporter: hundreds reportedly attended this church on sunday. >> the church is the most essential thing in all the world. >> reporter: doctors from the front line begging us all to stay home. >> you can think of it as your lungs being filled with fluid like you're drowning. then you need a ventilator to stay alive and we're running out of that equipment for people.

>> a young patient who was presumably healthy before they came in. this is not something isolated to the old. >> reporter: now, some good news. ford and ge health care announced today they are going to produce 50,000 ventilators within the next 100 days at a plant in michigan. let's hope they don't come too late for too many. >> thank you very much, nick watt. we're standing by for a briefing from the coronavirus task force from the white house, we'll have live coverage of that coming up. meantime, let's get an update from chief white house correspondent jim acosta. jim, the president seems to be taking expert recommendations very much to heart. >> reporter: that's right, wolf. we're in the rose garden right now, waiting for the president to begin this coronavirus task force briefing in just a few moments. but you're right, the president did listen to the doctors. he extended that deadline for social distancing until the end of april. the president has made other

claims about why the nation is experiencing critical shortage of much-needed medical supplies. those claims have yet to be explained. explaining his decision to keep the u.s. shut down for another month, president trump is pointing to the data from his experts, indicating the worst from the coronavirus pandemic is yet to come. >> we're thinking that around easter, that's going to be your spike, that's going to be the highest point, we think. then it's going to start coming down from there. >> reporter: that grim assessment came from the top two doctors on the coronavirus task force, dr. anthony fauci and dr. deborah birx. >> dr. debbie birx and i went into the oval office and leaned over the desk and said, here are the data, take a look. he looked at the data, he understood them. he shook his head and said, i guess we're going to have to do it. >> reporter: the deaths are projected to skyrocket to at least 100,000.

>> if we do things well, almost perfectly, we could get in the range of 100,000 to 200,000 fatalities. >> reporter: but the president is still making excuses, suggesting that hospitals are hoarding crucial medical supplies without offering any evidence. >> where are the masks going? are they going out the back door? how do you go from 10,000 to 300,000? and we have that in a lot of different places. so somebody should probably look into that because i just don't see from a practical standpoint how that's possible to go from that to that. >> reporter: that's leaving officials in new york puzzled. >> i don't know what that means, i don't know what he's trying to say. if he wants to make an accusation, then let him make an accusation. >> reporter: the president once again blamed the obama administration even though the trump white house has been warned repeatedly to prepare for deadly pandemics. >> we started off with an empty shelf. >> reporter: nearly three weeks ago mr. trump told the public his administration was prepared for the coronavirus. >> and we're prepared and we're doing a great job with it and it

will go away, just stay calm, it will go away. >> reporter: one of the long list of rosy predictions. despite worrying projections for the pandemic, the president is now describing his handling of the virus as a job well done. >> so we have between 100 and 200,000. we all together have done a very good job. but 2.2, up to 2.2 million deaths, and maybe even beyond that, i'm feeling very good about what we did last week. >> reporter: the president said one sobering sight was the dire situation at new york's elmhurst hospital. >> this is in my -- essentially in my community, in queens, queens, new york. i've seen things i've never seen before. i mean, i've seen them, but i've seen them on television in faraway lands. i've never seen them in our country. >> reporter: but the president is still clashing over dealings with some of the nation's governors. >> excuse me. are you ready? ready? ready? i want them to be appreciative of me, okay? and then you cut it off, because it's fake news. >> reporter: new york governor

andrew cuomo says this is not a time for politics. >> i am not engaging the president in politics. my only goal is to engage the president in partnership. this is no time for politics. >> reporter: now, it's not clear whether or not the president will extend the nation's social distancing guidelines beyond the end of april. he did suggest in the rose garden yesterday that the pandemic might not be fully under control until the end of may. but a source close to the coronavirus task force tells me that the doctors on that task force are fully prepared to recommend that those guidelines be extended even longer than april 30th, wolf, if the data shows that that is necessary. in the meantime, we give you a little bit of a sneak preview of what the president will be talking about here in the rose garden. they've just placed on this table next to the lectern what appears to be a coronavirus test kit. and so we expect the president to talk about that when this gets started shortly, wolf. >> we'll have coverage of that, of course. thanks very much, jim acosta at

the white house. we're joined now by the governor of maryland, larry hogan. governor, thank you so much for taking a few moments out and joining us. i wonder what goes through your mind, and you've got a lot going through your mind right now, when you hear dr. anthony fauci of nih, and you know him, nih in maryland, estimate that 100,000 americans, 100,000 people here in the united states could die from this virus. he said this on cnn this morning. i wouldn't be surprised if we saw 100,000 deaths. did you ever imagine you would be faced with anything like that? >> wolf, this is the best case scenario, according to dr. fauci, 100,000 deaths. and if you -- just to put that in perspective, that's more than the number of americans that died in the vietnam war and the korean war added together. and we're not talking about over a number of years. we're talking about in a very short period of time. i talked with dr. fauci over the weekend, and i'll tell you, he's been the guy that's been right on target with the facts

throughout this entire crisis. and we ought to be listening to him. and i'll tell you something that's really alarming, wolf, that most people have not been paying attention to. we've put a stay-at-home order in place today that was quickly followed by virginia and the district of columbia, because we're just two weeks behind new york, with a higher numbers here than they were at two weeks ago. so here in the nation's capital, where we're home in our three jurisdictions to 440,000 federal workers that are involved in the response for the rest of the nation, we're about to have an explosion, exponentially, of the same kinds of problems that are facing both new york and some of these other major metropolitan jurisdictions. i just want to make sure that everybody is focused here in washington about that situation right here in their own backyard. >> that's a very important point. we're about to hear, by the way, from the president in the rose garden with the coronavirus task force. you participated in a teleconference with the president, your fellow

governors, you're the chairman of the national governors association. on that call today, did you hear anything new from the president? were you encouraged or discouraged? because he's suggested apparently that testing is no longer a problem. >> so i thanked the president and the vice president for their efforts to date. there are a lot of things that they've made progress on. but i also raised the issue on behalf of my fellow colleagues that we're still -- and this is not pointing fingers, it's not trying to place blame, but at the federal level and with all the governors, we still have this major issue of testing and this pinch point about not enough ventilators and supplies and masks and ppes. it's not to say whose fault it is. it's just that we've all together got to get this thing solved because we're facing this crisis in america. and everybody's focused on it but we haven't come up with solutions yet. >> you declared this emergency, stay-at-home order today, and the governor of virginia did as

well, the mayor of washington, d.c. why today? was it a mistake not to do it a week ago, two weeks ago? >> actually we took some of the most fwraeaggressive steps in t nation, more than 48 other states. today was a clarification, a little bit step further. even some of the states that had stay-at-home orders did not go as far as we did with 26 executive orders that closed businesses and closed schools and took all kinds of actions. but today we took these actions because in our region, cases have more than quadrupled in just the past few days. we've seen a major escalation with very alarming numbers. and we decided the time was now to stop this virus in its tracks. and i was glad to see that my partners in the region took the exact same steps because we've got to work together as a region and we've got to work together with our partners. >> governor, we'll continue this conversation down the road, but in the meantime here is the president. >> great.

>> very comfortable here. a lot of room. and we appreciate you being here. yesterday i announced that we would be extending our social distance guidelines through the end of april. this is based on modeling that shows the peak in fatalities will not arrive for another two weeks. the same modeling also shows that by very vigorously following these guidelines, we could save more than 1 million american lives, think of that, 1 million american lives. our future is in our own hands and the choices and sacrifices we make will determine the fate of this virus and really the fate of our victory. we will have a great victory. we have no other choice. every one of us has a role to play in winning this war. every citizen, family, and business can make the difference

in stopping the virus. this is our shared patriotic duty. challenging times are ahead for the next 30 days. and this is a very vital 30 days, we're sort of putting it all on the line, this 30 days, so important, because we have to get back. but the more we dedicate ourselves today, the more quickly we will emerge on the other side of the crisis. and that's the time we're waiting for. the more we commit ourselves now, the sooner we can win the fight and return to our lives. and they will be great lives. maybe better than ever. today we reached an historic milestone in our war against the coronavirus. over 1 million americans have now been tested. more than any other country by far, not even close, and tested accurately. and i think what i would like to do is ask secretary azar, who has done a fantastic job, to come up and just say a few words

about the fact that we reached substantially now more than 1 million tests. please. thank you, alex. >> well, thank you, mr. president, for your leadership in marshaling all the resources that we have for this unprecedented testing effort. and thank you, mr. vice president, for leading a whole of economy approach to testing. as the president mentioned number that no other es hit country has reached. we're now testing nearly 100,000 samples a day, also a level that no other country has reached. i want to thank every partner that has been involved in this effort. that includes all of the men and women of the fda and the cdc, including director redfield and commissioner hahn. together, the fda and cdc have worked to balance the need for testing on an aggressive scale with the scientific rigor that

americans expect. working with our testing coordinate, admiral giroir, they have truly unleashed the ingenuity of the centerpieces of america's approach to testing. i want to that anythink state a leaders who have made testing much more easily accessible to americans who need it. i'm also grateful to fema who we are working with closely to get state and local partners what they need. i want to that anything administrator verma who has scaled up capacity for testing and treatment and ensured tests will be paid for. finally, we would not be where we are today without the many entrepreneurs, companies, and scientists who have worked day and night to develop 20 different emergency testing options with the fda responding to requests for authorization typically within 24 hours.

the number of options is growing nearly every day. fda has opened up new options for using the available tests like self-swabbing and new options for reagents. i also want to thank fda and other components of hhs for incredibly rapid action on other tools that we need. this weekend, we actually worked to secure 30 million tablets from sandoz and bayer for hydroxychloroquine and a method forst sterilizing masks. thank you, mr. president. >> thank you very much. thank you. i would like to ask dr. hahn to come up, fda, because we have some really good stuff. first of all, the numbers have been incredible on testing. but in the days ahead, we're going to go even faster and we

have something from abbott labs which is right here, and that's a five-minute test, highly accurate. and i maybe can show that as we listen to our fda commissioner, the job he's done and the approval process. we talked about the chloroquine and the hydroxychloroquine just now. i thought that i would mention it, but alex has already done that, but we have now tests under way with 1,100 people in new york and it was only the fast approval by fda that allowed us to do that, it was rapid approval. doctor, please say a few words, this is the five-minute test from abbott. >> thank you, mr. president, for your leadership, thank you, mr. vice president, for your leadership of the task force. i'm very proud of fda's staff work in the last few months to expedite the availability of testing in this country.

i'm also incredibly appreciative of private industry's ingenuity and willingness to work with us quickly to develop and distribute those tests. we've had a substantial addition to testing with the authorization of point of care tests, especially the abbott point of care tests which the president has pulled out of the box. a point of care test is a test that gives you a result where you're getting care. this is truly a patient-centered approach. whether it's the doctor's office, a hospital, an emergency room, an urgent care center, or a drive-by testing site. just like tests for influencefl strep, you go to the doctor's office and can get an answer within minutes of having the tests done. with the tests being approved for abbott and others, they're planning to scale up the number of tests throughout the country in the next couple of months and patients can get the answer in as little as 15 to five minutes. then of course an appropriate

plan of treatment can be given. we add fda are working quickly with abbott as well on other testing approaches and normally these tests take months to develop. i was on the phone today with the abbott ceo. he told me that normally this is a nine to 12-month approach to developing a point of care test. they did this in collaboration with fda and u.s. government within weeks. abbott has shared that they will be delivering these tests tomorrow and then will be ramping up. i just have to emphasize one thing, the most innovative and safe products come from the private sector in partnership with government, taking an all hands on deck approach just like in this case. and the other point here is that abbott and fda worked together to make sure we had a fast, reliable, and accurate test to market. thank you. >> great job. really great job. thank you, steve. so the pharmaceutical company, sandoz, has been working with us

very closely. and as alex mentioned, a little bit, 30 million doses of the hydroxychloroquine to the united states government has been given. and bayer has donated 1 million doses of the chloroquine, which will soon be distributed to states and state health officials around the country. teva pharmaceuticals is also donating 6 million doses of hydroxychloroquine to u.s. hospitals, 6 million doses. so the private sector, as you say, steve, it's been amazing what's happened, really amazing. and we're going to introduce you to some of the greatest business executives in the world today, no matter where you go, and they're going to say a little bit about what they're doing. and then we have so many more. the fda has also authorized the

n95 respirator mask sterilization kits. it's an incredible thing. i've been asking why are we throwing these masks away. you look at some of these masks, and they're significant pieces of equipment, i say, how come you throw them away, why aren't they using sterilization techniques. and i got a call from mike dewine, the governor of ohio, and he's a tremendous guy, tremendous governor, and he said, we have a company named batille and they're having a hard time getting approval from the fda. i called up dr. hahn and within a very short period of time they got the approval. steve, i really appreciate it. i want to thank mike and i want to thank steve. and they're going to be able to -- each machine now can disinfect 120,000 masks per day. now, think of that. each machine can disinfect 120,000 masks per day. it will be just like a new one. it can go up to about 20 times

for each mask. so each mask can go through this process 20 times. and they have two in ohio, one in new york, and one will soon be shipped to seattle, washington. and also to washington, d.c. so that's going to make a tremendous difference on the masks. this morning i spoke to our nation's governors to help each state getyesterday, vice presid mike pence asked our nation's hospitals to begin reporting total bed capacity, icu bed capacity, ventilator capacity, and vital medical supply levels on a daily basis. and mike, thank you for the great job. thank you very much. in new york, the 2,900 bed hospital under construction which is now completed, they completed it in three days. you might say 3 1/2 days, at the javits center. it will be completed today.

it will be -- and when you look -- i think we'll be adding some more beds which will be completed today. and we opened up -- whoops, there goes the box and my hair is blowing around, and it's mine. one thing you can't get away with, if it's not yours, you have a problem if you're president. and nearly 3,000 medical beds will become operational. the u.s. navy ship "comfort" also arrived today equipped with 12 operating rooms and 1,000 hospital beds. work has begun on additional temporary hospital sites, including a 600-bed capacity nursing home facility in brooklyn, and numerous floors of [ inaudible ] what they've done. the army corps of engineers, what they've done, they just completed, think of it, a

2,900-bed hospital in new york in just about three days, maybe four days. and the whole city is talking about it. on top of that, we floated in a great ship which is going to be a thousand rooms, which is being used for patients outside of what we're focused on, and that will free up a lot of rooms for what we're focused on. so it's been great. the army corps of engineers has awarded contracts for the construction of alternate care facilities also at the state university at stonybrook, state university old westbury, and the westchester community center, we're sending 60 ambulances to new york city today. we have a total of 60, we're getting some additional ones, with up to 190 more to follow at different locations. to date fema has obligated more than $1.3 billion in federal

support to the state of new york. so we're spending a lot of money in new york. it's a hotbed, there's no question about it. and we're spending a lot of time, effort, in new york, new jersey, spoke with governor cuomo a lot, spoke with governor murphy a lot in new jersey. and we're really getting the job done. people are very impressed and i'm very impressed by the people in fema, the people in the army corps of engineers, because what they've done, i've never seen anybody do anything like it. in addition to the 8,100 ventilators that we've already delivered over the last 48 hours, we're delivering 1,000, 400 are going to michigan very shortly, 300 going to new jersey, 150 ventilators to illinois, 150 to louisiana, and 50 to connecticut. fema and hhs already delivered

11.6 million n95 respirators, 5.3 million face shields, 4.4 million surgical gowns, and 22 million gloves. and i don't know if you just saw, it just came over the wires, that ford just announced just a little while ago that they will produce, along with general electric health care, 50,000 ventilators. and they'll be doing it in less than 100 days. on top of that we have other companies that are doing ventilators including general motors. but we have nine other companies doing ventilators as we outpace what we need, we'll be sending them to italy. we're going to be sending them to france. we're going to be sending them to spain where they have tremendous problems. and other countries as we can. but the fact that we're doing so many so quickly is a tribute to

our great companies. more than 14,000 national guard members have been activated and can help supplement state and local efforts to distribute personal protective equipment where we're sending a lot. we have plane loads coming in. we have 51 loads from various locations all around the world. and they're landing, we had our first big cargo plane land this morning. and we're getting it from all over the world. we're also sending things that we don't need to other parts. i just spoke to the prime minister of italy and we have additional capacity. we have additional product that we don't need. we're going to be sending approximately $100 million worth of things, of surgical and medical and hospital things to ita italy. and giuseppe was very happy,

they're having a very hard time. joining us this afternoon are ceos of the great american companies that are fulfilling their patriotic duty by producing or donating medical equipment to help meet our most urgent needs. what they're doing is incredible. and these are great companies. darius domcheck of honeywell, you know that, darius is somebody that i have dealt with in the past and he's a great leader of a great company. deborah waller of jockey international. a friend of mine, mike lindell of my pillow, boy, do you sell those pillows, it's unbelievable what you do. david taylor of procter & gamble and greg hayes of united technologies corporation. i want to tell all of you america is very grateful to you and what you've done, an amazing job you've done, thank you very much. i would like you to come up and say a couple of words if you like. come on up, fellas, please.

you have to say what you're doing, because it's been really incredible. go ahead, mike. >> my pillow is a u.s. vertically integrated company -- >> all right. we're going to continue monitor the white house briefing and get the latest information. the president now saying by what he has done so far, in his words, we could save 1 million american lives. some of his experts are suggesting at least 100,000 people here in the united states might die over the next several weeks, even as a result of all of these steps, maybe as many as 200,000. we heard those estimates coming from ambassador deborah birx and dr. anthony fauci. let me bring in john king, if he's with us right now, to get his immediate assessment on what we're hearing from the president. john? >> reporter: at the beginning, wolf, the president was trying

to be a pep talk, if you will, a pep leader of the country, saying we need to follow the guidelines, we need to beat the coronavirus, an active role for the president in trying to convince the country. he just told the country april is gone, the social guidelines will stay in place, the distancing, the economy will stay shut down. he was trying to say how critical it was if we all behave. then he got into the self-son gre -- self-congratulatory part of the briefing. this is monday, let's see where we are friday. the president keeps saying everything is great, these tests are getting out there, supplies are getting delivered. now ford is going to help make ventilators. that all may be fine and good in the long term but the president himself says the peak is coming easter, that's less than two weeks away. he had a call with governors, wolf, democrats and republicans, who said we appreciate all the help but it's not here today. so there's a disconnect between

what the president says in these daily briefings about how great things are and what the governors will tell you in the affected states. we're ramp up, there has to be some lag time, we all understand. but the governors are saying we need it now and the president is saying everything is fine. so there is a disconnect between the white house and the governors who say especially with the peak still coming in new york and other states around the country, they need it now, not when ford can produce it in a hundred days. >> a new record, so far nearly 500 people have died on this day, nearly 500 people have died on this one day here in the united states. it brings the total to 2,919. you know, john, as we see what the president is saying, he says, as you correctly point out, we will have a great victory, we have no choice. the next 30 days will be challenging times. but when he says the peak will only happen, the peak in the number of deaths, we're talking about, here in the united states, over the next another two weeks, suggesting that after

two weeks, the numbers will presumably start to go down. but there's no evidence of that. we've heard very different assessments coming from some of the medical professionals. >> reporter: there is no evidence of that right now. that may be somewhat aspirational. but that is the best case scenario. the president has been told by dr. birx and dr. fauci that if these social distancing guidelines stay in place, if the stay-at-home orders stay in place. i saw your interview with governor hogan a few minutes ago here in the washington, d.c. area, maryland, virginia, the district of columbia joining together, they think the tough times are ten, 12, 15, 18 days away. they think it will continue to get worse. there is some risk there. you want the president to be aspirational. you want the president to say we'll get through this. but the president, remember, was very dismissive at the beginning. now that he has signed on with the scientists and says these things have to stay in place, the question is does he get too hopeful on that front as well. but he is being told that if everybody follows the guidelines, if the states do

their job, that somewhere around easter he believes there will be the apex. we'll have to watch as this plays out. every day, another state reports a giant spike in numbers. some of those are smaller numbers than new york or california. but the numbers are still going up and going up. so the immediate challenge here is to enforce the social distancing guidelines. and then i would say the second challenge is, the governors who are experiencing high caseloads now, high stress and anxiety in their hospital systems now, they need supplies now. one of the things they've been frustrated with, they're grateful the president is ramping things up, many of them wish he would have done this sooner, many of them wish he would even now be more aggressive in ordering the companies through the defense production act to do more and do it quickly. there are some questions, whether it's ventilators, masks, other critical supplies, a lot of governors say, mr. president, you say things are going to get great, they are not great today. >> they certainly are not, the numbers keep exploding. kaitlan collins is watching all of this closely with us as well. kaitlan, we're hearing various numbers coming from the president. within two weeks, he says, there

will be a peak, and then presumably it will start to go down. as you note, he extended the social distancing guidelines until the end of april. and yesterday he said there might not be a turnaround until early june. so what are you hearing from behind the scenes? >> reporter: yeah, wolf, those days are something that's really surprising to hear the president, given that not only publicly last week, but privately, he was insisting they were hopefully going to reach that easter date to open the country. but dr. fauci said they had some blunt conversations with the president over the weekend that extending the deadlines was the only option. right what you're hearing the president and health and human services secretary alex azar talk about was testing and ventilators. they had this lab kit there, they say it's a portable lab test kit that will be able to produce results hopefully within minutes. that's something that they're

introducing that we know the president has been talking about privately. the question is when will it be available on a widespread scale. they'll start sending that out tomorrow but there are questions about when it will reach everyone. a lot of states are still struggling with testing. some of these are smaller states, more rural areas that doesn't have the same kind of capacities you see ramp up in places like san francisco and new york. those will still be vitally important as well. wolf, some of those people are very far away from their closest hospital, in very rural areas. that's going to be a big point of concern we've been hearing from governors and what they've been expressing to the white house in recent days as they are not only dealing with this just like the rest of the nation, but some of these places are just now starting to see how many people in their state, how many confirmed cases of coronavirus they have. that certainly is happening in my home state of alabama, that's something you've been reading the reports on, where people didn't realize how serious this was until recent days and they saw how many people have this. the other thing, wolf, the

president is talking about ventilators. he says ford has now committed to making ventilators as well. he says once the u.s. has more than it needs they'll start sending them to other countries. we should be very careful to say right now we are nowhere near close to numbers like that based on the conversations i've had currently have the ventilators they need. we know the president has invoked the defense production act to get general motors to start making ventilators. yesterday gm said they have not started yet, because it's a very complicated process, they have to retool their factories to be able to make these complicated machines. that is still something that is going to take some time. but he is saying they are ramping up. we know he's said they want to get 100,000 ventilators in 100 days. it w the question is will we be able to get there in a couple of weeks. the president says he expects to hit a peak in coronavirus cases in the next two weeks.

we haven't heard that from the doctors, we only heard that from the president so far. >> he suggested the doctors' suggestion based on models that there may be 100,000 or even 200,000 people in the united states who may die from coronavirus over the next several weeks. he said it could have been worse, it could have been a million or 2 million. so he's looking at those numbers, 100,000 or 2 thousa00, relatively good. daniel dale is with us as well, you always listen closely to the president, you're our fact checker. what did you hear? >> wolf, i haven't heard anything so far yet today that i could call objectively false. that's an improvement on trump's performances. we have to wait until the q&a before we see if he will continue to be factual. even with this largely factual performance, there is some important context. when the president touts chloroquine and hydroxychloroquine, we need to point out every time that there

is not evidence that these medications are safe and effective in treating the coronavirus. as kaitlan alluded to, when he touts how many tests have been done overall in the united states, it's important to note that, one, the u.s. lags other nations per capita, and that particular places in the united states are still short. so i think, you know, trump is not lying so far, but let's keep the facts in mind as we listen to him. >> we will listen, and once the questions begin, we'll go back to that briefing over in the rose garden over in the white house. dr. sanjay gupta is with us. the good news, the president says, sanjay, over 1 million americans have now been tested. >> yeah, i mean, this is obviously a significant improvement. and, you know, part of the strategy from a public health standpoint, to try and obviously prevent these numbers of people getting sick and number of people dying, wolf, the numbers you've been talking about, keep those numbers as low as

possible. i mean, you know, if you look at countries around the world that have done a particularly good job such as germany, for example, in terms of really decreasing the number of people who get sick or die from this, it was about testing, and frankly early testing as well. so it's good that we're testing. i think the testing obviously needs to be done in some of these states now where there's been little testing, and the assumption in many of those states is that there are few cases, but obviously without testing, wolf, we just don't know. i think, you know, this is a significant change, wolf, since you and i last spoke on friday in terms of now the plan, in terms of social distancing and the recommendations to last another month. but it's starting to sound more in line with some of the other countries like china, like south korea, that have already been through this timetable. their entire sort of curve was longer than what this will be, six weeks, so it is possible that even on april 30th, you

know, they're going to have to reevaluate and see whether this needs to continue. i know that's not what people want to hear but keep in mind, wolf, if you do this again, as we've talked about, very diligently now, it should shorten and decrease the number of patients, you know, in the future, wolf. so that's ultimately what this is all about. >> i just want to get your reaction, sanjay, to what dr. fauci said on cnn this morning. it's pretty stark. he said this, quote, i wouldn't be surprised if we saw 100,000 deaths, 100,000 deaths here in the united states, approaching 3,000 deaths right now. that would be 97,000 more deaths in the united states. is that realistic? what do you think? >> well, look, wolf, obviously i don't think anyone gets any joy at all or anything in terms of talking about these types of numbers. but, you know, frankly, wolf, i think that the projections, some of the projections that you hear are even higher than that. keep in mind, you talk about

just the seasonal flu in any given year kills tens of thousands of people. in 2017 it killed some 60,000 people. as we know, wolf, this is far more lethal and far more contagious. there is no vaccine for this. so the idea that without any sort of, you know, measures or just sort of ineffective mitigation measures, the numbers could reach several hundred thousand, even into the million range, is something that public health officials h about. this 100,000 number is really in some ways, wolf, a best case scenario, in the sense that it really counts on the fact that people are really following these recommendations to stay at home and to try and break the cycle of transmission of this virus. so yeah, i think it's very realistic, sadly, and i think that it's even one of those things that is dependent still very much on how we behave. we cannot let up at this point.

if we do, i think the numbers will be even higher than that, wolf. >> is it accurate if these steps had not been put in place, the stay-at-home orders, the social distancing orders, as the president said yesterday, it could have been 2 million people dead here in the united states? >> i mean, you know, these are all models, wolf. it's a little tough to say. but if you talk about something that is spreading, you know, very robustly throughout a community, you know, two to three times more contagious than flu, and up to ten times, perhaps, even more than that, more deadly than flu, then yes. i mean, that's when you start to get those sorts of numbers. i mean, you know, this is a pathogen that obviously can cause a lot of disease and death. one of the important things, wolf, that is emerging, and we saw this in italy, we saw this in other countries as well, is that in part, the number of people who die is determined by how serious the virus is, but also very much determined by how the medical system is able to

respond. this whole flattening the curve concept. so if a lot of these patients show up in these emergency rooms, in these hospitals, before the hospitals have the capacity to care for them, then even people who would have otherwise been saved, people who would have otherwise survived, sadly won't be able to. so that really factors into this as well. so there's two things, how serious the virus is, and how well our medical system can keep up. that's what this flattening the curve is all about. right now you're hearing about hospital systems that are getting pretty full. in new york, as you heard, wolf, they expect the peak to be around mid-april. but in florida, wolf, they expect the peak to be in mid-may. so this is going to happen at various timetables around the country as well. and we have to be prepared for that. >> we certainly do. kaitlan, i just want to point out to our viewers, and i want -- kaitlan collins is with us, and i want our viewers to appreciate, that at least the president is now accepting the recommendations, the strong

advice of his medical experts like dr. fauci and dr. birx. he was earlier reluctant to do so. let's listen in, the q&a is about to begin. >> -- updates as to where he are, where we think we're going, and timing. timing is going to be very important because we have to get our country back, we have to get our country back to where it was and maybe beyond where it was, because we've learned so much. but we will have lost a lot of people. and in many ways they're heroes. and if you look at what's happening with our medical professionals, it's a danger. they're warwarriors. men and women are doing a job the likes of which nobody has ever seen. i see them coming out of planes today, going to new york, going to the most dangerous locations, dangerous areas, and they go in there and they just want to do the job. and you see the numbers, you see the numbers like i see the numbers.

i have some friends that are unbelievably sick. weal we thought they were going in for a mild stay and in one case, he's unconscious, in a coma, and you say, how did that happen? i want to thank all the great professionals, men and women, doctors and nurses and paramedics and first responders and law enforcement, by the way, if you look at the new york and you see how -- the effect it's had on law enforcement, it's been incredible. these are great people. firefighters. great people. they're helping in so many different ways. so thank you very much. if you would like, we'll take a few questions. john, please. >> reporter: thank you, mr. president. yesterday you said that you would be extending the guidelines through the end of april and that you would be giving specifics tomorrow. do you expect that the guidelines will just carry on, the guidelines that have been in place now for 15 days, could

there potentially are some modification? also, you had some travel restrictions that came up for reconsideration, the one from the eu on april 13th, canadian, u.s., mexico border, april the 21st, what will happen with all of that? >> they'll be staying, we may add a few more, but the guidelines will be very much as they are, maybe even toughened up a little bit. they're having an impact, they're having a tremendous impact, and that's the key, we're having a tremendous impact from it. >> reporter: ford ramping up production of ventilators, sending thousands of ventilators across the country. clearly the supply is increasing. but when you look at the production curve against the hospitalization curve, can you guarantee that everyone who needs a ventilator in the next few weeks will be able to get one? >> well, i think that some are ramping up to a level that they're not going to have to, john. and i think that we also have kept in reserve, we have almost

10,000 ventilators in our line. we have them -- we've held back just because we did the stockpile. we didn't want to give them because we don't know where the emergency -- this hits like so fast, it comes so quickly, and we have 10,000. we're probably going to send some of them now, we've been sending a lot to michigan and various other states, we'll probably send some additional ones to michigan. new york has been doing very well but we can add some more to new york. we're adding them to areas that have having a problem, even alabama flared up a little bit as you saw over the last couple of days. we'll send them down to alabama. we have 10,000, we kept them for this very specific purpose. it sounds like a lot but it's not, when you think about it. but we're making a lot. when you see, they're talking about hundreds of thousands being made in a short period of time, because if you look at just -- so we have now ten companies at least making the ventilators. and we say, go ahead, because

honestly, other countries, really, they'll never be able to do it, it's a complex piece of equipment, it's big and expensive. >> reporter: do you believe as we approach this peak in the next couple of weeks, there will be enough for the american population? >> yes, i think so. i think we'll be in very good shape. we had a great call today with the governors. they were -- i actually said that i hope that the media is listening to this call because it was a really good call. and that was randomly selected, largely democrats and republicans, and i think for the most part they were saying thank you for doing a great job, and we discussed that at the end of the call. people are very happy with what we're doing. now, the circumstances are so terrible because of what's going on. but i think they're very impressed by the federal government. i watched that beautiful ship floating in today, into -- you know, weeks ahead of schedule, almost four weeks ahead of

schedule into new york harbor, the "comfort." i watched the "mercy" floating into los angeles a week ago, almost a week ago. and they are stocked, they were really ready to go, they're stocked with both talent and tremendous amounts of equipment. and the navy and everybody else involved, they got it ready so fast. it's just incredible what they can do. they've geared up. that's why i am so impressed by. mike and i were talking about it before, the level of genius to put it together so quickly. a month ago nobody had heard of this. nobody had any idea. the mercy was being maintained, in maintenance for a month. when they heard we needed it. they said, sir, we are ready to go. i said what do you mean, you are not going to be ready for three weeks. they said, no, sir, we are ready to go. the building of the hospital, 2,900 beds in a matter of a few

days is incredible. governor cuomo was impressed and gavin newsom was impressed with what we are doing with california and los angeles in particular, but all over california. when you look at what we are doing with michigan, we are getting along well with michigan. we are sending a lot of things to michigan because that's becoming a hot bed specific area. it has become hot. it could at some point supersede, but it has to be taken care of. the relationship we have with the governors, i wish you could -- we took a lot of calls from a lot of different states. i wish you could have heard. even a thing like where the governor of ohio calls where he has a company that does the sterilization, but they have a problem because it's not going quickly at the fda.

i called steve and he said we will get it done. they checked it and got it done almost immediately. originally they were approving it for 10,000 masks and ultimately they approved it for 120,000 masks. i kept wondering why aren't they sterilizing these masks. i thought maybe they couldn't do it. but you look at them and it is not cloth and looks like it could be sterilized. they have a piece of the machine over there. i won't bother showing it to you. when you talk about five minutes or 15 minutes and highly accurate and not nearly as disturbing to do as the other task, so we have gotten better. we are doing things nobody else thought of. please? >> issues with -- the governor

of virginia issued a 70-day stay at home order. is that constitutional? and secondly, is it warranted to issue a 70-day guidance at this point? >> we are letting governors do what they want. they consult with us in some cases. some go further than others as you know. i could give you examples, but i am not going to do that. number one, it would be controversial. some governors have taken it further. people are questioning that. staying at home with respect to what we are talking about doesn't bother me at all. people should be staying at home. oan? >> you have 2,369 children killed by their mothers through electtive abortions each day,

16,500 children killed each week. two states have stopped abortion, texas and ohio. should more states be doing the same? >> i think what we are doing is we are trying to as a group, governors, republicans and democrats, we are working together to solve this problem. what you are mentioning has been going on for a long time. it's a sad event. a lot of sad events in this country, but what we are doing is working on the virus, working on the hidden enemy and i think we are doing as good a job as you could possibly do. when tony and deborah came up with numbers yesterday that said if you did nothing you could lose up to 2.2, maybe beyond -- but 2.2 million people if we did

nothing. i can't tell you what the unfortunate final toll will be, but it will be a small fraction of that. we are doing a good job. yes? >> are you considering a nationwide stay at home order? i know a lot of states have put them in place, but some haven't. and i have a question for dr. birx, too. >> we have talked about it. obviously, there are some parts of the country that are in far deeper trouble than others. there are other parts that, frankly, aren't in trouble at all. hopefully we will be able to keep it that way by doing what we are doing. we talked about quarantine the other day. a group came and wanted to do the quarantine. i said let's think about it. we studied it and by the time evening came it was tough to enforce and something we didn't

want to do. but we did advisory. i think that's doing well. i look at the streets. look at new york. i looked down fifth avenue today primetime and there was nobody on fifth avenue. i have never seen that before. no car, no anything. so i think the people of this country have done an incredible job. if we do that, we will let you know, but it's pretty unlikely. >> another quick question for dr. birx. you had mentioned today that this model that predicts 100,000 deaths is if we do things almost perfectly. are we currently doing things almost perfectly? or are there more things we need to do to not exceed the 100,000 or 200,000 model? >> thank you. that's a really great question.

tomorrow we will go through all of the graphs and information that we took to the president for the decision. but when you -- and i want to thank the data team that is working day and night. i usually get my data about 2:00 a.m. from them. they assimilate all of the data from all of the states. when you look at all of them together, all of them are moving in exactly the same curves. that's why we believe this needs to be federal guidance so every state understands it may look like 2 cases today that become 20 that become 200 that become 2,000. that's what we are trying to prevent. i think states still have that opportunity. but they are going to have to do all of these recommendations. these recommendations are recommendations that the globe is using. we do recommend that every governor and mayor looks carefully and ensures their

communities are utilizing these guidelines. >> it is amazing. louisiana for a long time was stagnant, nothing. then all of a sudden -- i look one day and i see a lot and a lot and then it explodes. we are working carefully and powerfully with them, building hospitals and a lot of things for louisiana. please, go ahead. >> this could be seasonal, cyclical virus. maybe both of you could comment on this and dr. birx as well. are you prepared for this to strike again, say, in the fall? all of the efforts now to contain this, be proactive? >> we are prepared. i hope it doesn't happen. doctor, would you like to say something about that?

>> in fact, i would anticipate that would happen because of the degree of trance missability. however, if you come back in the fall, it will be a different ball game than when we first got hit with it in the beginning of the year. several things different. our ability to test, isolate and contact trace will be orders of ago i magnitude better. and we will have hopefully more interventionings. and we have a vaccine on track and multiple other candidates. i would anticipate in a year or year and a half we would be able to do it under an emergency use if we see an efficacy signal. things will be very different. what we are going through now

will be more than lessons learned. it will be things we have available to us that we did not have before. >> please, go ahead. >> scott gottlieb, your former fd tave fda commissioner wrote a roadmap. >> i saw it. >> he wrote everybody wear a mask in public. >> we haven't discussed it, but we could. we are getting the number of masks you need. i saw his suggestion on that. we will take a look at it. for a period of time, not forever. we want our country back. we are not going to be wearing masks forever, but it could be for a short period of time after we get back into gear. i could see something like that happening for a period of time. but i would hope it would be a very